BKLYNR, a New Web Mag for Every Corner of Brooklyn, NY

BKLYNR, a new web magazine, promises to bring articles from every corner of the borough, not just the hipster enclaves that have made “Brooklyn” synonymous with uber-trendiness.

Twice a month, BKLYNR (pronounced Brooklyner) will publish in-depth stories about the political, economic and cultural life of Brooklyn. It will “strive to produce thoughtful, compelling journalism that explores new narratives, rather than retreading tired tropes.”

It is interested in writers, photographers, multimedia producers, artists and comics artists. Writers should email contribute@bklynr.com. COLUMBIA SPECTATOR alumni Thomas Rhiel, Raphael Pope-Sussman and Ben Cotton founded the web magazine, which will contain three articles per issue. The first issue will be available April 4.

New Gaming Magazine Resonates with Nostalgic Gamers

GYGAX, which launched this January, targets anyone who remembers the defunct gaming magazines DRAGON, WHITE DWARF, ADVENTURE GAMING, and PEGASUS.

Gygax will cover tabletop gaming and the tabletop gaming community. “I wanted to ensure the viability of tabletop gaming for future generations,” founder and Editor-in-Chief James Elliot said. “I wanted to look at how we play games today with all the new distractions that are available – from video games to IMAX films. What does that mean in the 21st century?” His magazine will focus on the culture of gaming – past, present and future, featuring stories and content about tabletop games and RPGs, such as 1st and 2nd editions of AD&D, Pathfinder and D&D Next.

It will be available digitally as a PDF and Apple Newsstand for the iPad. The magazine will be available at game shops soon, and it will also be for sale at some upcoming game conventions. It is published by New York-based TSR Inc and the magazine website is at gygaxmagazine.com. Only a general inquiry email address is available, djinn@gygaxmagazine.com but the website features their submission guidelines.

New Custom Published Magazine to Launch for Walmart Canada

WALMART LIVE BETTER is a new custom magazine for Walmart Canada by Rogers Media (CHATELAINE*, FLARE*, TODAY’S PARENT*.)

The mom-focused publication will amplify Walmart’s brand promise “Save money, live better” with Rogers-created content spanning four key pillars: Food, home, health, and beauty and fashion. Food will be a primary focus in the magazine, said Rosalyn Carneiro, Walmart’s public relations manager. “The food-related content in the magazine will be about one-third, including the front cover.”

The magazine will offer practical information, tips, inspiring ideas and relevant information designed to “help moms and their families save money and live better.”

The content team will be led by Rogers Media’s newly appointed Editor-in-Chief, Sandra Martin. The print edition will be published six times a year starting in April 2013. The issues will be timed to coincide with key sales periods such as the holidays and the back-to-school period. One million copies will be distributed free of charge at Walmart Supercentres across English Canada, with plans to expand into the French market by next year.

Rogers will also produce an iPad version of the publication, while content will also be housed on a dedicated microsite accessible through Walmart.ca.

Bonnier Title to Cease Publication

CARIBBEAN TRAVEL + LIFE* will cease publication beginning next year.

Bonnier will fold the title’s content into ISLANDS*, a bigger and stronger travel magazine it publishes and increase its frequency to 10x.

Islands will produce two Caribbean-themed issues in May and November, as well as publishing regional editorial in each issue. This move is aimed at establishing the publication as Bonnier’s flagship travel title.

Can’t magazines do any better?

Where is the creativity?

Pinterest is the hottest social media right now, driving more traffic to websites than even Twitter.  So, after starting our own first board of…what else? magazine covers…we thought we’d look around for inspiration for additional boards.

First we had a ball checking out tons of funny, crazy, beautiful, far-out, sweet, disturbing boards (careful, this site is addictive.)  After losing a couple of hours, we – naturally – turned to the magazines for inspiration.

And…that’s where the fun stopped.

While we didn’t think that the big titles would break away totally from their brand images, we thought that with all the talent they have for hire, they would surprise and delight us.

Nope.

SHAPE* admonishes us to use Pinterest in healthy ways: For example, display your life goals on “vision boards” and create a “gratitude board.”  Its own 29 boards, almost all healthy, seem to do nothing but nag: Healthy Breakfast Recipes, Lower-body Workouts, and Get Fit in 2012.  Most interesting/unexpected board – or at least the cutest: How Puppies Improve Your Health (let’s just hope they get their html under control soon.)

COOKING LIGHT* is clinging close to its editorial brand: Comfort Food, Super Sandwiches, Easter Recipes and Menus.  Most interesting/unexpected board: Blogs We Love (but food blogs, of course.)

PARENTING’s* boards included Stunning Nurseries and Kids Rooms, Most Fashionable Kids, and Halloween Treats and Eats.  Most interesting/unexpected board: Fun with Science was the best we could find.

Even THE NEW YORKER* didn’t dare to divert from its brand; there were carefully selected covers of course, and – what else? – the famous New Yorker cartoons.

TIME*, the newsweekly, is clearly panicking that you won’t remember its name, so it plasters it everywhere, including in all the board titles.  It gets a little repetitious.

Inexplicably, the most photogenic of all the major magazines – except perhaps LIFE – NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC*, does not even have a Pinterest board.  And neither does Life, as far as we can tell.

Desperate to find something exciting, we checked boards from non-magazine media but they also stayed pretty close to the brand: For example, The Weather Channel’s Recipes board featured winter or spring cuisine.  The Today Show had some fun memories in Anchor Antics, but in general, no media strayed too far from the company line.

Is that what we want?

When is a magazine a magazine?

Is it a blog?  Is it a magazine?  Is it a website?

Attempting to discern and define the differences between various media, is, at best, a moving target; rapidly changing in the digital environment.  For us at Wooden Horse, it’s a constantly shifting, headache-inducing occupational hazard.

If you look in a dictionary, you will find definitions for the word magazine, such as, “A periodical containing articles, stories, pictures or other features.”  And while all other dictionary definitions closely resemble this one, the meaning of a blog finds less agreement.

One definition claims a blog is a personal website, where one posts their thoughts, opinions and experiences.  Another says it can have one or many contributors, and may be focused on a single topic.  More comprehensive definitions for a blog mention common characteristics, such as writing in the first person, unfiltered content, reverse chronological order and comments.

As for a website, that all-inclusive term, can refer to any web page with hyperlinks that is hosted on a web server.  Gee, that narrows it down.

Not.

To cope with the issue, many freelancers have developed their own criteria for determining how to identify a magazine, website or blog.  Some of the personal rules we’ve run across include:

- If the content is updated daily, that makes it a website and not a magazine.
- It’s a magazine only if there’s a print edition (sorry, LONNY and sisters).
- Blogs use “I” and “We,” while magazines use those references only in editorials.
- Blogs have an informal tone, while magazines have more rigorous rules for language.
- A blog is a site created with blogging software.
- A magazine has an editorial staff to plan, filter and polish content.
- A magazine accepts contributions from outside sources, not just in-house.

One recent example that brings this growing dilemma into focus is ROOKIE, the new online fashion and lifestyle magazine launched by teen blogger Tavi Gevinson.  Much has been written about her association with Jane Pratt, founder of JANE and SASSY magazines, and about whether Gevinson is a style sage or just a flash-in-the-pan novelty.  But our question was more basic.  Is her magazine even a magazine?

Does it have monthly content?  Yes.  Is there an editorial staff?  Check.  Are there contributors?  Check.  A masthead?  It’s there.  But it also features updated posts three times a day, with someone’s personal musings.  Major media outlets refer to Rookie as a magazine, but a visit to http://rookiemag.com reveals that Rookie describes itself as, “a website for teenage girls,” in one place, and “an online publication for teenage girls,” in another.  It would seem even the staff is ambivalent about the correct label.

Regardless, it’s likely that more hybrid publications with multiple personalities will appear in the future, and with increasing frequency.  Life is going to get tough in the Wooden Horse offices.

What do you think?  How do you define and label media outlets?

Will magazines on tablets ever be proitable?

Tablet apps are very popular with magazine publishers.  “Conde Nast and the other [publishers] are looking at the tablet market as the promised land that will deliver them from the plight that they are going through in print and online,” Roger Entner, founder of Recon Analytics, a research and consulting firm, said to TheWrap.com.

But are they making money?  No hard figures have been released, but Conde Nast’s iPad editions, for example, are making up just 1.3% of its total print circulation.  Each publisher, of course, believes its in-house monetizing strategy will unclog the profit faucet.

However, it’s going to get even more complicated before it’s over.  Apple is rumored to release a newsstand app in September; Amazon is rumored to launch its own tablet soon; HP unexpectedly got out of the market; the joint venture Next Issue Media (which some day might even do something) is still trying to provide “an easy and economical entry into the digital reading channel”; and let’s not forget Flipboard.com…

“We’re all in the sandbox,” Entner commented to The Wrap.  “We’re in the process of stepping out of the sandbox.  Hopefully we don’t stumble over the rim.”

B2B titles are still struggling…

…at least according to the audit agency BPA Worldwide.  It just released its ‘US Consumer Trac Data’ report for the six-month period ending June 30, 2011.  For example, venerable BILLBOARD saw a 100% decrease in circulation.

Newsstand sales reported only two magazines in the gainers’ column: AMERICAN WOODWORKER at 34% up and MARIN at 22% up.

Wooden Horse Friday Round-Up

BRIDES MAGAZINE said goodbye to Kimberly Forrest, fashion editor for local publications in multiple East Coast cities, including Atlanta, Maryland, New Jersey, New York and Washington, D.C. No replacement has been announced…

SEVENTEEN named Kaitlin Menza, kmenza@hearst.com, as the new associate lifestyle editor for the magazine.  Before coming to Seventeen, Menza was an entertainment assistant and blogger for GLAMOUR…

MOMS LIKE ME, a Missouri-based parenting magazine, has ceased publication.  The website will remain as a national social networking site, connecting moms throughout the U.S. Sony Hocklander, shocklander@news-leader.com, the magazine’s print editor, will continue as editor of the site’s Ozarks section…

JEWISH ACTION magazine named Rashel Zywick, zwickr@ou.org, as the new assistant editor, replacing the departing Anna Socher.  The magazine is published by the Orthodox Union…

BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK hired Nikhil Hutheesing, nhutheesing@bloomberg.net, as deputy managing editor for finance.  Before coming to Bloomberg, Hutheesing had been managing editor for DAILYFINANCE since 2009…

GQ magazine brought onboard Mary Kaye Schilling, marykaye_schilling@condenast.com, as the new senior articles editor.  Schilling had been culture editor at New York magazine since July 2008…

LAPTOP MAGAZINE and its assets were acquired by digital publisher and content provider, TechMediaNetwork.  The magazine will continue to publish in all formats, including print, web and mobile, and all 23 full-time staff members will join the TechMediaNetwork office in New York.  The sale is reportedly a win-win for both entities, with TechMediaNetwork using Laptop’s content throughout its network of sties, and Laptop leveraging TechMediaNetwork’s assets to expand its digital presence.  Laptop has been published for 19 years…

FORTUNE hired Miguel Helft, no email yet, as the new technology senior writer, beginning in August.  He will serve in the magazine’s San Francisco bureau…

Once a local urban title, Canada’s Spacing magazine has a national debut

SPACING, a local Canadian magazine based in Toronto, relaunched on Monday, June 6th as a national publication. Sporting four different regional covers for Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Vancouver, the content has been expanded to include all of Canada’s urban centers, covering the civic, political and aesthetic issues surrounding urban life.

The first national edition features diverse topics like an in-depth article on the top 100 public spaces in Canadian cities, street performers in Victoria, how Ottawa’s marathon is becoming more urban, profiles of four Canadian civic leaders, the impact on cities of professional sports arenas and the success of a seasonal pedestrian mall on Rue Ste.-Catherines.

At 112 pages, it’s the largest issue of Spacing since it began in 2003. The magazine will continue to publish three times a year. Managing editor is Todd Harrison, toddharrison@spacing.ca. For a full list of the editorial board and masthead, visit the website at http://spacing.ca